


i've held this dream (for such a long time)

by anovelblogwrites



Category: Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins
Genre: Angst, Character Death, Post-Book 3: Mockingjay, but with like a dash of fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-08
Updated: 2020-07-08
Packaged: 2021-03-05 04:26:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,517
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25138423
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anovelblogwrites/pseuds/anovelblogwrites
Summary: Okay,” she whispers, pulling away again. She kisses the ever-present crease between his eyebrows. “You really have to go now.”  When Gale’s eyes open, the room is dark, and the sheets are cold.
Relationships: Gale Hawthorne/Madge Undersee
Comments: 6
Kudos: 54





	i've held this dream (for such a long time)

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: please accept this humble offering of sad angst. i listened to “like a river runs” by bleachers a lot while writing this and it shows.

It’s the details that get him. 

The birds outside the window are warbling the same tune as soon as the sky starts to pale, casting the same bluish haze over the room. His tired eyes can just make out the books on the nightstand, the dresses lined up by color in the closet. A pile of ribbons on the vanity, his own clothes thrown across the chair. If not for the warmth radiating off of Madge, he might mistake the graceful lines of her neck and shoulders for a shadow. But she’s here, curled up next to him with her hair spilling over the pillows and her mouth curving into a lethargic smile. 

He watches her blue eyes flutter open, meeting his. She’s gotten used to him watching her, and is far beyond being coy about it. She doesn’t bother trying to hide herself with the soft, rumpled sheets when she leans in and kisses his bare shoulder, up his neck before whispering, “Good morning.” 

He closes his eyes again, and blindly rests his finger against her lips, “Shhh.” 

“Gale,” she tries to sound stern, propping herself up on an elbow so she can look down at him disapprovingly. He cracks open one eye, just to see that pout again. “You’re going to be late.” 

He reaches out to her, running a rough palm over the soft expanse of her back and nudging her down. He winds his arms around her, and despite herself, Madge relaxes into him. She runs her fingers through his hair. 

“Don’t care,” he hums into the crook of her neck, breathing her in. 

Her laugh is like warm honey, “It’s time to get up.” 

Not ready to start another day without her, Gale stubbornly draws her in closer. 

“Gale,” she snorts, squirming in his arms until she can brace her hands on either side of his head, and push up just enough to hover above him. Her hair falls in a tangled curtain around them, tickling his neck. Everything melts away, and for that second, it’s just Madge. 

Madge, with her soft thighs and cold toes. Madge, pressing her lips relentlessly to his cheeks, forehead, nose, neck and anywhere else she can reach. He struggles to keep his eyes closed, his face neutral. 

“I know you’re awake, jackass.” 

He breaks. A smile pulls at the corners of his mouth, which doesn’t do much for the credibility of his mumbled, “No, you don’t.” 

He’s still smiling when she kisses him. Their teeth knock together once, before they melt into each other. With some maneuvering, Gale reaches up to hold Madge’s cheek. He kisses her softly and evasively. Each brush of his lips is so light, he can barely feel her against them. And though Gale’s intention was to lure Madge in, he is the one that is fully entangled once she takes the bait, catching his bottom lip between her teeth while she threads her fingers through his hair, keeping him close. 

“Okay,” she whispers, pulling away again. She kisses the ever-present crease between his eyebrows. “You really have to go now.” 

… 

When Gale’s eyes open, the room is dark, and the sheets are cold. 

The digital clock on the nightstand reads 4:25 a.m., but Gale knows he won’t be going back to sleep. Not after that. 

There was once a time when he would already be awake and dressed anyway, creeping through the Seam, ducking under the gap in the electric fence. Instead, he shuffles to the kitchen and presses a button to start a cup of coffee, and opens the sleek gray refrigerator, reaching for a carton of eggs and fresh greens. 

The small part of him that had been hoping he could get through today without realizing it was today crumbles when his phone starts ringing. Before even getting up to answer, Gale knows that it’s his mother, calling to check on him, like she does every week. 

But this morning, the worry in her voice isn’t resigned when she asks, “How’ve you been?” 

“Alright.” 

She sounds weary when she says his name. Gale doesn’t want to know what she’s going to say next, so he cuts her off, “Really, Ma. I’m fine.” 

There’s a long pause, “Okay, honey.” 

Gale winces to himself, and tries to keep his tone lighter when she passes the phone off to Posy because she sounds just as cautious has his mother. Rory does not ask to speak to him, but that’s the least of his troubles today. 

… 

Finch talks Gale into going out after work, and as much as he doesn’t want to go, he doesn’t want to be alone with his thoughts even more. 

Or so he thought. Because once he gets to the bar, it’s too loud. Even the air feels abrasive. But that’s not even the worst part. Because although the fuzzy music and dull roar of conversation grates against him, does nothing against the looks on his friends’ faces--as if he were made of glass. 

Without finishing even half of his drink, Gale sets it down on the bar and walks straight through the crowd, and out the back door. 

Gale breathes in the fresh air like a drowning man. It’s the first cold night since summer began. His skin prickles, and it feels like waking up. He leans against the wall and stares up at the sky, and for the first time in a long time, he lets himself remember District 12. Miss it. He can’t see the stars from the city, but now, with his eyes closed, the bricks scraping against his back seem to melt into the soft grass of the meadow, where he would lay on his back long into the night, gazing up at the swirls of stars above. 

“It kind of feels like they’re staring back,” Madge had said the first time he brought her with him. He knew exactly what she meant. In moments like that, he thought that it wasn’t just the land that surrounded them that was alive. They’d spent hours like that, laying shoulder to shoulder while he pointed out the constellations he knew. 

But then there’s the squeal of rusted hinges and the heavy clang of the door slamming against the wall, startling Gale back into the alley behind a dive bar in District 2, where one of the new recruits is hovering in the doorway, the lager in his hand sloshing over the rim of the glass. Gale doesn’t remember his name, but recognizes him by the gap between his two front teeth and that earnest gleam in his eyes that only boots seem to have. 

“Hawthorne!” He cheers, as though Gale was the prize at the end of a scavenger hunt, and he was the winner. “We was wonderin’ where ya wandered off to.” 

Gale felt himself frown. The bar was small, it wasn’t as if there were many corners for him to disappear into. 

Before the smart remark makes its way to Gale’s lips, Finch and Watt’s heads pop up behind the kid. Watt’s elbow to his side is obvious to everyone but the kid, who just rubs one hand idly over his ribs, while trying to wave Gale inside with the other, sacrificing even more of his drink in the process. With matching looks of exasperation, Finch and Watt throw their arms around the boot’s shoulders and guide him back inside. 

Before the door closes, he hears one of them explain, “It’s the three year anniversary today. Of the bombings in 12. He… he lost someone.” 

Gale almost laughs to himself at the understatement. He didn’t just lose Madge. He lost a piece of himself--a piece he didn't even know he had. But like a shadow that can’t exist without the sun, it disappeared when her light went out. 

He was left staring into the dark, and eventually, it started to stare back. 

… 

The few minutes between closing his eyes and falling asleep are the worst, sometimes to the point that the minutes stretch into hours, and when it’s really bad, those hours melt away with the darkness. But sometimes, Gale thinks the days spent in the company of aching bones and heavy eyelids are more tolerable than those few minutes of waiting, because he knows what’s coming. 

The smoke, so thick it burns his eyes and feels almost solid in his lungs. Each breath is more strained than the last, but he doesn’t slow down. He watches the planes circling above more than the streets as he tears through them, but he’s come to know this path as intimately as he knows the woods. 

He’s only a few paces away from the garden gate when the roof caves in. 

On those nights, Gale wakes up coughing and opens the window to let out the invisible smoke. He’ll stand there, gripping the window sill with both hands and count the stars until the shaking subsides. Sometimes it takes all night. 

But sometimes, it’s worse. Sometimes, the scene is so achingly familiar, he forgets he’s dreaming. 

It’s the details that get him.


End file.
